In tribute to my current writer's block.

Comments

[BVR]

what r u trying to write?

[Nathaniel R]

i was trying to write about The Hunger Games. But in general. it's been tough this week as the sparse posting surely suggests :)

[3rtful]

Aww the best way to beat writer's block is to write about something unrelated to what you're attempting to write about. Maybe it's a good time to write about actresses who are cat ladies? Anjelica Huston, the late-Sandy Dennis, and Melissa Leo playing a cat lady in the new movie Francine.—All Supporting Actress winners!

[skyfly_to]

This is a rare moment for me because i saw the movie before i knew what you think about it. I am following your blog a long time mainly because your humorous joyful writing and our common taste in movies. But lately my fear is growing that i am influenced by your reviews/grades. So it is a nice change to not know what you think.

Here is my review in a few sentences.

first half hui - second half pfui
good performances from everybody involved
shaky cam cant cover up bad action scenes
and hurts a lot in dialogues.
the settings had so much unused potential (riots etc..)
that ending.. so cliche i wont spoil it.
ultimately I would give Thumbs down.

[Philip]

"But lately my fear is growing that i am influenced by your reviews/grades."

I've realized that actually happens to me all the time. I talk about movies being bad when I haven't even seen them. Sure, I trust Nathaniel's opinion a lot and we share similar tastes, but it's not healthy because there are movies I haven't seen just because I convince myself they're bad because he wasn't fond of them, and I also talk about them that way. I need to start really seeing things for myself (it's not always possible where I live, or with money circumstances, but still). My friends got really annoyed because I didn't want to see The Descendants even though it was playing at my university's cinema (which means I could see it for free), because I was convinced I would hate it.

Lol, this rants over now. :p

[Terence]

I just wrote a review about The Hunger Games. Great script, good performances, HORRIBLE direction and cinematography.

As a fan of the books, I was glad that they managed to streamline the story to fit the screen but the visuals ugh...

[Bhuray]

Film Bitch Awards! :)

[James T]

The picture took a while to appear, so at first I there was only the text on my screen which I thought was a genius idea. "Nothing, in tribute...."

OK, so, Hunger Games.. I'll watch it only if you give it at least a B+ cause I'm really poor right now.

[Robert G]

I can only think of one time in recent memory where I let the court of public opinion influence my reviews. I would have been a lot harsher on the stuff I didn't like about The Artist if I had been up to dealing with the potential backlash. Even then, I still would have given that film a good score. I have no problem being on the losing side of negative or positive criticism if I stand by my viewing of a film.

As for The Hunger Games, the more I think about it, the more I like it. The direction--other than getting that many kids to give strong believable performances--left me a little cold. Then I started to think that the point of the film is to make you as numb as Katniss by the time the games start so all the time jumps and heightened emotional stakes make more of an impression. I'm going to be tussling with that for a while. It's no "did Kinji Fukasaka try to make Battle Royale a bitter dark comedy" argument, but what is?

[adri]

I can understand having writer's block after reading The Hunger Games. People have mentioned that it's written in the first person, but it's also written in the present tense, a recent fashionable affectation. First person/present tense is a pace-destroying, character-dulling, plot-numbing, conceit that delivers (as one reviewer said) an incessant internal drone. They said in making the movies that the first thing they had to get rid of was the first person narrative.

So you know how they say when you are writing, that you write like the last thing you read? I wonder if when a person is writing about a movie, if the movie's wrestling with it's script affects the review? One reviewer mentioned that most HG reviews don't actually talk about the movie, but about the reviewer's response/stance on it.

I'm going to see it today, so I have no opinion yet.

[Johnny]

You should combine your ideas and write about the awesome Shelley Duvall!!!

[iggy]

What about the new female stars in the rising? After Jennifer Lawrence has won herself a place in people's hearts (I know it's cheesy, I wanted to type it) with her interviews and her sense of humour and self-deprecation, it's interesting to compare her with Mara. Both in franchises, both talented, young, hot and Oscar nominees, and completely different at the same time. I don't know, just an idea.

It's just that after seeing Lawrence in interviews I was really surprised at how funny she is and I thought she should do a Romy & Michelle kind of movie, with Emma Stone. Provided she's as funny in movies as in interviews. Then I thought about Stone-Mara-Wasikowska-Lawrence and that new generation of female movie stars that has the potential to be as interesting as that of the Gosling-Fassbender-Hardy, even if a bit younger.